That's true, but owning a gun makes someone more likely to successfully kill themselves. It also makes an argument that othewise might just end in injury, more likely to end in death.

Drunk driving is illegal. Drunk use of firearms is illegal.

Cars are designed and intended to transport people. Firearms are designed and intended to kill people.

Auto manufacture, acquisition, and operation are heavily regulated. Firearms manufacture, acquisition, and operation are barely regulated.

You have a null set and a unjustifiable imbalance.

you are going to tell me that the transatlantic form of slave trade or nazi germany are comparable to the orange revolution?

on an unrelated note what happened over there in ukraine just a couple years back now? wasn't there more unrest? does that not tell you that perhaps the people were not sucessful? ah i guess not

" So read a bit more history"

how about you give me another example than something as silly as the orange revolution?

"There are far more stable and peaceful democracies around the world that have sensible gun ownership laws, including restrictions on carrying, licencing and bans on certain types of guns than there are peaceful and stable democracies that have a constitutionally entrenched right to own guns allowing carry of hidden weapons around in public."

not getting your point here if something is more numerous than something else what bearing does that have on how beneficial it is?

I believe you're referring to rifles alone. According to this pro-guns article (which evidently counts on its readership being stupid enough not to actually click and read through the table it provides), for every person murdered with a knife or cutting instrument in the USA in 2013, eight were murdered with a gun.

For every SINGLE person stabbed to death in America, EIGHT are shot to death. Of those, over HALF are murdered by handguns.

You asked where we draw the line? Maybe with scientific evidence. All reputable evidence clearly dictates that America needs far, far greater restrictions on firearms of all kinds.

Edit - Modified the title, so that it is not misleading.

oh my mistake i know that it is established fact that knives kill more than guns its just that its rifles in particular

oh and i disagree with your last point because again where do we draw the line if we state that the concern is the lives of citizens 

do we stop alcohol from being produced because it causes deaths, rapes etc? for example

"which evidently counts on its readership being stupid enough not to actually click and read through the table it provides)"

how is that evident? it states right there in the heading that its reffering to rifles

Over 300 million armed citizens > any military

Now for some facts: The majority (61%) of gun-related deaths in the United States are suicide. The majority of gun-related homicide is gang related -- there are roughly 772,500 gang members (78% hispanic and black) in the United States -- a pretty small and specific segment of the population. Focus on educating and bringing hispanics and blacks out of poverty and you will see less gun-related homicide -- it's that simple. You don't have to infringe upon the rights of others and you make the world a better place.

As others in this thread have said, a great place to start is intent.

Alcohol is a dual purpose product. The primary purpose of guns is to kill people. Alcohol causes a tonne of death and harm in a range of ways, and I am not defending it at all.

But its also irrelevant to the guns debate. Science proves that guns are enormously harmful to American society. How on earth is it relevant if alcohol is enormously harmful to American society? I am quite confident a 1 mile asteroid would be enormously harmful to American society, but the prospect of one hitting shouldn't mean we accept the enormous harm firearms do.

The article is clearly trying to intimate that guns are less harmful than knives - obviously that is an outright lie!

first crate a controversy that wasn't even happening, then claim victory over that made up controversy taht's the republican way ;)

My own experience is growing up and learning to shoot skeet, as well as small arms use in controlled environments.

When I was 22ish, I was hanging out with friends, they were part of some frat at SDSU, so we were partying, and some of us left to get our cars, mine was parked in the school parking structure.

I was sitting on the tailgate of my truck while my other friends were doing coke in the cab. A car full of what I perceived to be nefarious characters drove by while yelling some less than flattering things. Before I had a moment to digest the situation, there were 3 guns pressed against my body, two in my belly and one against my neck.

Thankfully, they didn't see anyone in the cab of the truck, while they screamed and yelled and emasculated every ounce of my self-worth. They wanted my money, and luckily I had a wad of $1 bills that actually looked like a bunch of money. So they grabbed and ran, and drove away.

I know to this day it was a toss of a coin that didn't keep one of those assholes from killing me, they were more than ready.

My own experience.

Never touched a gun since. I'll only touch a gun if called upon by my country.

There are a few things I do have to say about guns.

- First, I noticed people mentioned slavery in the United States. It's interesting because there is an old saying in the American West. People used to say that Abraham Lincoln may have freed the slaves but Samuel Colt made them equal. He was already dead by then but his guns helped freedmen stay free. Blacks in post-Civil War America faced a lot of shit and despite what you've seen in Hollywood films, a large percentage of American Cowboys were actually former slaves since there was far less discrimination in the open west as opposed to the more populated east. They were good at the work that was required on the ranches and finding work out there wasn't a problem. Also, nobody was going to fuck with a former slave with a gun.

- Second, some well known peace loving people actually support gun ownership. This includes Mahatma Gandhi and the Dalai Lama. Isn't that something. The people who supported non violence also believed people should arm themselves. I also know that in the United States in particular, the places that have the more strict gun laws also seem to have the higher crime rates. This is because even though the law can restrict law abiding citizens from getting guns, it doesn't stop criminals from getting their hands on them.

I'm not a gun nut. I don't own a gun and I probably don't have any intentions on owning a gun any time soon. But here's my position. The more you try to ban guns, the worse things will be. History has taught us that when you try to ban something, it makes the problem worse. America banned alcohol in the 1920's and not only did it generate criminal organizations, more people were drinking than ever. More recently, we declared war on drugs. Look how that turned out. There are a few places like Japan where citizens do not own guns and the police forces are lightly armed, but I think that's more of a cultural thing than anything else.